


My life, be it long or short.

by TayBartlett9000



Category: British Royalty RPF, Historical RPF, The Crown (TV)
Genre: 1947, Britain, Commonwealth, Dedication, Duty, Empire, Future, Gen, History, Honour, Love, Monarch - Freeform, Princess - Freeform, Queen - Freeform, Service, Speach, declaration, kingdom - Freeform, royal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-15
Updated: 2021-01-15
Packaged: 2021-03-13 04:13:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28772154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TayBartlett9000/pseuds/TayBartlett9000
Summary: April 21, 1947. Princess Elizabeth makes her twenty first birthday speach.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 7





	My life, be it long or short.

Cape Town, South Africa. 21 April 1947.

Elizabeth had often wondered how her father’s people celebrated their birthdays. Did they gather their loved ones around them? Did they attend parties? Or did they spend their birthday wondering what the next phase of their lives would demand of them? Elizabeth didn’t know. She was fairly sure however that her father’s people would never spend their birthdays touring South Africa while at the same time preparing what was possibly going to be the most important moment of their lives.

But that was what she was doing.

Elizabeth had never much liked making speaches, but this speech was making her more nervous than any of the speaches she had made thus far. This was down to two main reasons, the first being that her shyness often seemed to sap her of some of her confidence. It was the second reason that troubled Elizabeth the most. She knew how important this speech was. She knew that the words she said today would impact greatly upon the rest of her life, indeed that the speech would change her life. She had rehursed this speech too many times to count and yet as she prepared to speak, she could feel the nervousness making her heart flutter. This was going to be the most important day of her life.

Elizabeth wondered briefly how many of her father’s people had turned twenty one today as she had. Thousands. Millions maybe. It was an important age, the age at which a girl truly became a young woman. She was feeling that now as she prepared to address the commonwealth, wondering how many of those twenty one year olds would be listening. She bowed her head for a second, hoping to God that she would be able to carry out this particular speech without a single misstep. She was nervous. She was about to commit herself entirely and for the rest of her life to a cause that was far bigger than herself. She was feeling the weight of that realisation now as she stood there, gathering together the courage she would need to battle through this. 

“Are you ready, your royal highness?” someone asked.

Elizabeth nodded. It was time. There was no turning back now, not that she would have had the ability to do so if she had wished to. Her father hadn’t had the luxury of choice. Elizabeth knew what she had to do. It was time to declare herself, to put duty before anything else. She was ready.

“On my twenty first birthday,” she began, pleased that her voice sounded far stronger than she was feeling. “I welcome the opportunity to speak to all the peoples of the British commonwealth and empire, wherever they live, whatever race they come from and whatever language they speak.”

She paused for a moment, reflecting upon the magnitude of what she had said. She had joined her parents on enough royal tours now to know how many nations formed part of the great commonwealth. Elizabeth had often heard her father stating that each one of those nations and every one of their peoples were dear to him. She could only hope that she would be able to equal the dedication that he had so often shown the empire.

“Let me begin by saying thank you to all those kind people who have sent me messages of good will. This is a happy day for me, but it is also one that brings serious thoughts. Thoughts of life looming ahead with all its challenges and with all its opportunities.”

Indeed, hers was a life that was going to be fraught with challenges. They were challenges that she had seen her dear father face often over the years. She had seen the worry that had lined his face, the anxiety over a difficult decision and the gnawing doubt over whether said decision had been the right one to make. Elizabeth knew that when the day dawned, when it came time for her to take her place as queen, she would have to find the strength necessary to face those same challenges. As she prepared to go on, she sent a silent prayer to God. ‘Grant me that strength, lord,’ she pleaded. ‘Please give me the strength I will need to carry out my duties to the full.’

“At such a time it is a great help to know that there are multitudes of friends around the world who are thinking of me and who wish me well. I am grateful and I am deeply moved. As I speak to you today from Cape Town, I am six thousand miles away from the country where I was born. But I am certainly not six thousand miles from home. Everywhere I have travelled in these lovely lands of South Africa and Rhodesia, my parents, my sister and I have been taken to the hearts of their people and made to feel that we are just as much at home here as if we had lived among them all our lives.”

She thought about the vast crowds who had been there to greet them as they had arrived in the towns and villages that had formed their long and winding root through the beautiful lands of South Africa. She wondered how many of these people truly loved them as she had said they seemed to. Had they truly taken herself and her family to their hearts? She hoped so. For she had taken every single one of those people to her heart, though she knew not one of them personally.

“Although there is none of my father’s subjects from the oldest to the youngest whom I would not wish to greet, I am thinking especially of the young men and women who were born about the same time as myself and have grown up like me in the trrible and glorious years of the second world war. Will you, the youth of the British family of nations, let me speak to you as your representative? Now that we are coming to manhood and womanhood, it is surely a joy to us all to think that we shall be able to take some of the burden off the shoulders of our elders who have faught and worked and suffered to protect our childhood?”

Elizabeth felt a smile blossoming onto her face as she spoke those words. She imagined her fellow people sitting before their radios, possibly thinking the same thing as she. Theirs was a glorious opportunity to change the world for the better. Her elders had won the war for them, with God’s help of course. Now, it fell to Elizabeth and millions of others to ensure that the dark days never made an appearance again, whether in Europe or anywhere else. Elizabeth again thought of her fate, that fate being that of a monarch. She wanted hers to be a brighter world when she took her father’s place. She was willing to do anything to make sure that that happened.

“We must not be daunted by the anxieties and hardships that the war has left behind for every nation of our commonwealth. We know that these things are the price we cheerfully undertook for the high honour of standing alone, seven years ago, in defence of the liberty of the world. Let us say with Rupert Brooke, ‘Now God be thanked who has matched us in this hour.’ I am sure that you will see our difficulties in the light that I see them, as the great opportunity for you and me. Most of you have read in the history books the proud saying of William Pitt that England had saved herself by her exertions and would save Europe by her example. But in our time we may say that the British empire has saved the world first and must now save herself after the battle is won. I think that is an even finer thing than was done in the days of Pitt, and it is for us, who have grown up in these years of danger and glory, to see that it is accomplished in the long years of peace that we all hope stretch ahead. If we all go forward together with an unwavering faith, a high courage and a quiet heart, we shall all make of this ancient commonwealth that we all love so dearly, an even grander thing. More free, more prosperous, more happy and a a more powerful influence for good in the world than it has been in the greatest days of our fore fathers.”

Elizabeth dearly hoped that this was true. She had seen more than enough conflict to last a lifetime. She didn’t want to see anyone else lose loved ones in battel. She didn’t want her nation to have to struggle once again against the evil force of hatred.

“To accomplish that we must give nothing less than the whole of ourselves. There is a saying that has been born by many of my ancestors. A noble motto. I serve. Those words were an inspiration to many bye gone heirs to the throne when they made their nightly dedication as they came to manhood. I can not do quite as they did. But through the invention of science I can do what was not possible for any of them. I can make my sollumn act of dedication with the whole empire listening.”

This was it, the most important part of her speech, the words that were going to bring about a drastic change in her life. She was about to say the words that would seal her fate. And she was more than ready to say them.

“I should like to make that dedication now. It is very simple. I declare before you all that my whole life, whether it be long or short shall be dedicated to your service and to the service of our great emperial family to which we all belong. But I shall not have strength to carry out this resolution alone unless you join in it with me, as I now invite you to do. I know that your support will be unfailingly given. God help me to make good my vow And God bless all of you who here willing to share in it.”

That was it. It was over. Elizabeth smiled. She had performed perfectly. There was no going back on her vow now that it had been made. She would never go back on it. She could feel the weight of that moment settling upon her shoulders. But it was a weight that she was more than willing to bare. She was one day going to be the queen of Britain and the commonwealth and she knew that she had no chance of governing effectively if she did not pledge the entirety of herself to the service of the people. The best monarchs, she knew, were the ones who respected the people they ruled over. She wanted to be one of those monarchs. Elizabeth wanted to gain the peoples’ respect as her father ha had done and she could only hope that her speech had reassured them of her inttentions. Elizabeth had never been so sure of anything in her life. Her life was not her own to live. Her life was to be given over entirely to the people. She heard those words inside her head again. ‘I serve.’

And she would serve. She would serve her people to the upmost until the day she could serve them no more. And she would be very glad to serve.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why but every time I listen to that speach, it brings me to tears. I think it's because I believe that our queen truly meant what she said on her twenty first birthday. She meant to dedicate her life to the service of her people and I believe she has and still does. God save the queen.


End file.
